Western Maine Audubon’s final talk of the Fall season will be by a Nature Conservancy staff member experienced with small dam removal projects within the state of Maine. The talk will be on November 15th at 7:00 p.m. in the Thomas Auditorium in Preble Hall at UMF. It is free and open to the public.

“Conserving the lands and waters on which all life depends” is the mission statement of the Nature Conservancy. They have been closely involved with dam removal projects across the state of Maine.

Small dam removal has been controversial, and consideration of removal of the Week’s Mills dam in West Farmington is no exception. The Atlantic Salmon Foundation would like to remove the dam to aid the repopulation of Atlantic salmon to the stream waters above the dam.

Come and hear the pros and cons of such a project through a look at similar projects which have taken place in other parts of our state. The talk will center on the ecologic changes expected with dam removal so that we, locally, can be better informed about the project proposed for our area.

Jeremy M. Bell is the River and Coastal Restoration Program Director for The Nature Conservancy in Maine. He has more than 17 years of experience as a restoration ecologist and project manager and is the strategy lead for river and coastal restoration for The Conservancy in Maine. Jeremy has helped secure over $14 million in federal grant funds and has successfully implemented more than two dozen projects in Washington State, Massachusetts, and Maine. In 2013, he received a Gulf of Maine Council Visionary Award for his work restoring coastal wetlands in Massachusetts.